The selection of Herman Van Rompuy as the European Council’s first full-time president has earned front page mentions in the Polish press — with short articles and, of course, haikus. But he’s going to have to say something meaningful before receiving full news treatment.

Reuters

Van Rompuy arrived at a news conference after being elected as EU president.

Gazeta Wyborcza, Poland’s highest-circulation upper-market daily, advertises a Van Rompuy haiku on the front page and sends us to page 11. What else, it’s “Hair” again. I see a strong candidate for a Nobel Prize in literature.

The federalist-leaning newspaper with king-making aspirations on the domestic front is learning to live with Van Rompuy and hopes he won’t matter (“he will be more of a chairman during discussions than the EU’s president”), but is openly unhappy with the selection of Catherine Ashton as the EU’s top diplomat.

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“It’s not clear if the Briton will manage to work out compromise solutions in the EU’s policy toward Russia or if anyone, for example the White House, will want to treat her as the true representative of the EU,” the daily says calling her unknown and uncharismatic.

Anti-federalists are equally unhappy. Conservative daily Rzeczpospolita mocks the choice, saying the nominations are the victory of Germany and France and a defeat for Poland that wanted a more transparent selection process.

“The nominations mean nothing good for Europe,” the daily says in an editorial. “Europe’s president is a man who will have nothing to say on the international stage, while the foreign minister is a woman who has no experience in diplomacy.”

But that’s what Poland wanted, it turns out.

“We’ve agreed that we won’t give the new EU leaders too much power,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said just before walking into the conclave that picked Van Rompuy and Ashton.

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